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The national collection illustrates and invites research into United States philately and postal operations. It contains prestigious postal issues and specialized collections, archival postal documents and three-dimensional objects that trace the evolution of the postal services.

The National Postal Museum is divided into galleries that explore America's postal history from colonial times to the present. Visitors learn how mail has been transported and the wondrous diversity of postage stamps.

The Museum supports a wide variety of interdisciplinary research projects which address topics of importance such as current and future postal operations, as well as philatelic and postal history. Our efforts are a resource and point of reference for research and wider investigation by historians throughout the United States and the world.

Mary Katherine Goddard (1738-1816)

Mary Katherine Goddard worked with her brother, William, in his printing shops in Providence and Philadelphia before the pair moved to Baltimore, Maryland. Left to manage the daily operations of the family's print shop while her brother was away drumming up support for his Constitutional Post, Mary Katherine Goddard published The Maryland Journal, numerous almanacs and broadsides.

Through William's influence, Mary Katherine became Baltimore's postmaster in 1775. She held the post for 14 years. But in 1789, Postmaster General Samuel Osgood removed her from the position stating that it would require "more traveling . . . than a woman could undertake." Osgood appointed his political ally, John White, a man inexperienced in postal operations, to replace her.

Mary Goddard approached her publishing duties with great enthusiasm. Her printing coup was her publication of the Declaration of Independence on January 18, 1777. It was the first copy of the Declaration listing all of the signers to appear in print.

Goddard's customers protested her dismissal. She had, by all accounts, been an accomplished postmaster. On November 12, 1789, over 230 citizens of the city of Baltimore presented Postmaster General Osgood with a petition demanding her reinstatement. In their plea, the petitioners noted that Mary Katherine Goddard gave "universal Satisfaction to the community" and they were "praying in the most earnest manner that she be restored."

The citizens' petition was unsuccessful. Having already lost her printing business to her brother, Mary Katherine Goddard turned to selling books, stationery and dry goods. She died in Baltimore on August 12, 1816, still beloved by the community she served so well.